Rogers Pass Dec 27-30 2008

Well the avalanche report was in the Christmas spirit with lots of red on the board. So we had to play it safe but with 70cm of new snow it was a bit of a challenge to find safe steep skiing. If the slope was under 25degrees you could not even ski.

Skiing the cheops on the first day after the big snow fall we skinned up to the top of the ridge and skied back down the ridge to what we thought to be the Hourglass gully. We got some great turns at the top but then it turned into a mega bushwhack all the way down to Connaught creek where we got a few more good turns. The funny thing about our tour brings me to my next little rant.

Up Track and follower.

We woke up the next morning to find a little note posted in the info center that the up track going up Cheops went to the wrong spot and was way to high on the ridge, and the people that followed us up and used it did not have much success with the end result not retuning to the info center until after dark by head lamp. Well the lesson to be told here is you have to still have to use your own brain and make decisions for your self. We did not put in a wrong up track for your objective we put the track exactly were we wanted it and skied the line that we had in mind.

One more little up track note that got me going. I broke a trail up NRC gully yesterday and I had 50cm of ski pen. I chose this line up to make it safe and to not put an up track in the middle of the ski line. I made it 2/3 up the slope and some guys caught up to us. They offered to break trail for awhile and instead they just traversed across the whole slope and found the old up track in the middle of the run. I don't under stand why people are so lazy and won't do anything on there own. Well I am making a stand. I will not be lazy when it comes to up tracking.

Dec 9 2008 Louise Falls

Climb Lake Louise Falls today with Josh and Jeff B. It was a busy day up at the falls there were 5 groups that climb it today. We were third in line and we still waited 2hrs at the base of the third pitch. The pillar was a little harder than I expected due to the chandelier ice but still great climbing.

Dec 3 2008 Copper Mt

Well a short and cold day out climbing I am glad this climb had lots of walking and not much climbing involved. The descriptions said a 500m grade 3 but it turned out to only have two short pitches of ice. O'well if was perfect for the day and I needed to get a little bush wacking under my bet for the season.

Ranger Creek Dec 1 2008

Well another warm day in the valley but we racked up our gear and went out in the mountains. We were are the parking lot at 8:30am it was well above zero. We hiked in and broke a good sweat in the heat. While climbing a storm rolled in a brought wet snow in to the climbs and rain down on the spray road. Ya don't plan on skiing up in spray any time soon.!
A long story short we climbed Lone Ranger & R&D. The second pitch of Lone Ranger was much harder than grade 3 the gear was harder to find than it should be but that set us up for R&D and that felt much easier.

Just another day having fun in the sun!

Skating in Banff Nov. 31 2008

WOW the skating was awesome! You went from normal ice to perfectly clear ice. You can see the bottom of the lake chase the fish very cool

Snivelling Gully Nov 20 2008

A Great day of early season ice climbing.

Driving from Calgary not all Bad!!!

Pumpkin Carving

Ya we are ready for Halloween this year Heather and I Carved some pumpkins.

Utah Trip October 2008

Sleepless in Utah.

We started our journey down the road to the US after a great Petro Canada gas station breakfast sat morning. We drove past the boarder with a little delay from the anal US customs, we drove all the way past Salt lake City and slept in the ditch for a few hours and made it to Moab before any thing opened. We ate another greasy breakfast and then off to the gear store to pick up the guide book for the area. We spent the next two days climbing in the Moab area.
Day 3 we decide that we were in the mountain biking meca so we rented bikes and road the slick rock trail it was awesome. After the 13miles on the slick rock and the 3 miles on the practice look we decide that we wanted to ride a little more so we went across the valley and did another short ride. You would think that would be enough for the day but we had the great idea to go and check out Arches National park where we thought we could get a quick evening climb in. After driving and looking at the Arches we got to the climb and the wind was blowing hard across the desert so we pulled the pin on the climb and continued on the tourist program and took some photos from the car. That evening we went for bed early and hope to get up early and head to Indian Creek but we got the rude awaking from the police evacuating the camp ground because of a forest fire about 200 m from the camp ground so at 12:30am we stared to back up our camp and head off to the red cross shelter but we bailed and found some camping up at the slick rock trail and got back to bed at 1:30 am.
Day 4 we still made it to Indian creek at 10:00 just in time for the sun to come up and get the rock warm by noon we were climbing shirt less. Well not much to say about Indian Creek but we got school and the climbing was awesome!
I must THANK all the people who we borrowed cams from because with out the 100 cams we took down there would have been routes that were not possible. One route we did took 12 #2 and 3#3 cams wow that is a lot and boy “O” boy I used them all.

Well back to work and fun around the valley. Great trip and is a must do again.

Bugaboos Aug 23-24 2008

Well a splitter weekend in the Bugs. We got in two great little routes Ears Between and McTeck Arete. We also managed some time to do a little relaxing and some hiking around this beautiful area. All though our trip went well there was no shortage of excitement out there in Bugaboo Provincial park there were some rescues, people getting lost and lots of people climbing. At least the weather was good the reports from this week look cold and Wet.

Jeff

Vernon Aug 16-20 2008

Well had a great little vacation at Chad's cabin in Vernon. We got as much water skiing in as my body could handle. Now we are home and back to work I am lucky that I am still moving well enough to type let alone climb.